MELISSIA- A CRETAN MOUNTAIN VILLAGE

   Melissia

                       

This church was made with love

     One our favorite places on earth! A windy mountain road ends at this village. The sounds of goat bells, roosters and "Ella na na" fill the air. I don't know the history of the village. It is in the middle of nowhere and it is beyond me how it was found and settled centuries ago but you will have a hard time finding a more beautiful village. It is an old village and is mentioned in Cretan songs and mantanades because it is known as a legendary village that is tied to the mountains. Part of an old song or perhaps a mantanades says,  May the mountains of Crete rise up but then come down again so Melissia can be seen rising above all of them. 

One of the most
beautiful churches I have seen!

     Melissia has a large water source so Paul and I think someone centuries ago followed the water up to the source and settled that area. If anyone knows how it was settled please let us know.   Here is a picture of a spring and the area women used to do laundry. Can you just imagine wash day? I imagine all the women and young girls scrubbing their clothes which must have been dusty and dirty from so much work in the fields and with animals. 

This was taken at house in the mountains. It is for water. There are many"ruins" if you walk around you can see glimpes of the old life. 

      Missing are pics of embroidered linens, the inside of Katina's house such as her white plaster walls with three black dresses hanging, Georgo's canes, handmade chilopita as well as bread drying in her room. The kids left the Kindle,which had tons of pictures on it,at their house so we have a good excuse to happily visit with them again soon and when I get it I will update with those pictures. I like those types of pictures because the old life is slowly dying out. It captures a place in time that will soon be lost. So thankful the kids can live it and see a different way of life.

KATINA
Katina looked as wonderful and strong as always.

In the jeep-o.

on a walk with Katina and the boys

Michelle and Katina. As you can see we ate all our delicious dinner. Here's what was on those plates, pork with a spectacular sauce that was made with wine, olive oil , tomatoes and onion ( of course all home grow/made,  potatoes( from her garden) on the top. It was incredibly tasty.

a word about her potatoes. 

Each time we come she has lot of potatoes 

covered with a white powder in a basket in the 

kitchen. Years prior there would be hundreds of

 pounds of potatoes in her room, sprinkled

 with the white powder. 

kalitsounia- greens and homemade
cheese in dough and fried/cooked

    

Georgo's grave, Katina's husbands. 

Filenia's grave

Filenia, Katina's mother, sadly passed away a few months ago. Her life, could we have written it down, would have been fascinating. She raised her children alone, as her husband was shot during the civil war in Greece. He was shot by locals over property argument. He was young, maybe in his 30's.  I remember her has a very sweet, patient women. She lived in a very old traditional home( pics below) and made beautiful baskets out of plastic grocery bags. She also made colorful rugs out of scraps. Here's some pics of her house.

Pithari- Paul's grandma used these for olive oil, olives, dried nuts- we can assume that Fileno did this as well as these were in her house.

PTheir version of old time plastering was done with bamboo sticks, they plastered over them. 

Laina- It was a ceramic water jug that they kept in here. It had a round bottom so it was easy to pour from. The opening was shut with an "agathi" which is something resembling a spiky tumble weed branch which prevented anything from going in the water but made for easy pouring. 

       I can't stress enough about the wonderful and rich time we have with them. Theo, Mano, Stavroula and Nico played all day, every minute of the day and our kids picked up so much more Greek being with their Greek speaking cousins for two whole days. I could hear Mano saying, "paíxei bála" or "pame upano"in his basic Greek or Theo translating for me when I had no idea what fouvesmenos meant. We were so thankful that Stavroula and Nico were able to spend the night- such a rich experience all around for the kids. We just loved both those kids. Stavroula is filled with life!

     She is always smiling or laughing. A beautiful girl with a heart of gold. Nico is all boy and kept our kids busy with playing and laughing. Great kids! One thing I have noticed in the villages is the helpfulness of the younger girls. They set the table, offer us treats or get us water. Stavroula, although she is only 10, did all that.
 

Play Time with the kiddos

Theo, Mano, Nico and Georgo's grandson. 

This is in Kastelli. 

Back in Melissia, Uno and drawing. 

Uno now, chess later

Nico and Mano, cousins

DINNER

Chicken, potatos, glystida, vleeta, tomatoes and wine was grown, made or raised in this village. The wine and vinegar comes from harvesting the grapes, crushing them and pouring the juice into barrels. Olives are tended to all year and harvested/pressed in October. Salt is schlepped from the ocean.  We still have a huge bag of salt from gathering it with Georgo years ago and it is delicious. 

Here's our handsome cousin Georgo at the head of the table. When the kids were young he would take them to gather eggs or see the animals. He has a heart of gold and the boys look forward to seeing him each time we visit. 

Mano and Adoni. Adoni is watering down Mano's wine. Mano still didn't like it. Village wine has a unique taste. 

 The Models! 

This has nothing to do with our post today ...

 We went to Hania a few nights ago and the kids had fish pedicures! This is a big thing here but mainly for the tourists. 

Onto  Kolymbari

This one is for Owen- freshly caught fish 

Family, do you recognize this tile? No? That's because it brand spankin' new. You'll have to come to the house Kolymbari to enjoy it in person. 

new kitchen

Grape Harvest

Grapes:
Crete has a long and ancient tradition with grapes.
For a really good explanation about the history of grapes in Crete click on this.( http://www.cretanpaths.com/en/post/its-grape-harvest-time).  Cretans  successfully cultivated and traded olive oil, cereal and wine during Minoan times and Homer informs us that , at his time, Cretan wines were renowned throughout the known world.


Today, the kids were invited to take part in this ancient tradition. They helped harvest grapes. We'll bring the grapes to the village of Melissia to make moustalevria with Katina. ( Family- we are going to melissia this weekend to spend the night with Katina and we'll visit the girls in Kastelli also) Since Katina is old, she has such great knowledge of the ways things were done. This is the time of year people pick their grapes, press the grapes for wine and make moustalevria which you can see down below.

Theo cutting grapes but not really liking it :) 

moustalevria- grape pudding sprinkled 

with sesame and walnuts- 

made in September around here. 

I'll show step by step once with 

make it with Katina in the village

On another note....

Paul is making co-klus today. Do you know what that is?

 Think of a creature in your garden that has a shell, 

is squishy and has two antenna.

Yes, that's right- he is making snails today. 

It was quite the discussion at the market today. 

Paul was given much advice as to the best way to prepare them. 

People wanted to come over and eat with him and share a glass of wine in the process. 

There are two ways to cook them, fried or boiled ( cochinestes) with tomato sauce. 

The locals here are all for cochinestes even thought the recipe called for for frying. 

Many people just enjoy the potatoes/broth that are cooked in the water of the snails. 

Dinner at Nectario's House

We went to Nectario's house for a great dinner/ cretan bbq.  Nectario, Thanassi, Thanassi's wife Christina and their adorable daughter Julia, Paul, the boys and I enjoyed grilled veggies, local brizola ( pork chops), loukaniko ( locally made sausages, which were incredible). Again, nothing in America tastes as good as the food here. I am not sure if is the soil, the sea air or what but everything is flavorful.  Cretans take delight in their food. 

The ugliest thing on the table is the most delicious in this case

Loukaniko  sausages are the dark ones in the front of the picture. They are ugly but incredible! The others are store bought and paled in comparison. 

Nectario preparing the veggies

Thanassi and Nectario preparing lamb, and brizola

while the girls drank their wine out of HUGE glasses.  Nectario is well versed in hospitality and food. He is an expert in wine selection and these cups are to let our noses go into the cups along with our mouth while we drink our wine to get the full enjoyment. 

LOUKAMADES 

We stumbled upon a delightful place  in Hania to have dessert. They serve spoon sweets and loukamades. Loukames are fried dough balls with a sweet syrup on it and sprinkle of sesame or walnuts. Paul and I chose traditional and the boys chose.........

loukamades covered in nutella!

Such a treat! 

Spoon Sweets 

Here are my favorite items on the menu..spoon sweets. These are very traditional. My favorite is quince. I had it in the village of Katsamatado when Adonia gave us some in November. 

Ever since then, I am hooked. These are kumquats. They are not like jelly or preserves. These are very sweet and retain a nice texture. They are not mushy at all. They are delicious.  Here's a bit of history on spoon sweets http://greekfood.about.com/od/discovergreekfood/a/spoonsweets.htm

Historical Village of Gribiliana

Welcome to Gribiliana

     Since we are too busy with housework ( electrical stuff, concrete work, new toilet, getting the house in a normal living condition) and adjusting back to homeschooling we have not visited the relatives much yet. Therefore, we have been able to take in more of the sites around here than in previous years.  This village is part of Kolymbari,( actually Kolymbari is still Gribiliana) just two minutes away by foot! On a small mountain, untouched by tourism is a place where Turkish,Venetian and old Greek homes still stand. Some newer home are built over ancient ones. There are few places that are unspoiled in today's world. It seems that everything has a price tag involved, especially if you are traveling. This one is free and awesome and will make you feel like you went through a portal in time- back hundreds of years. 

Venetian times

                 

Venetian House- what isn't shown is the concrete floral engravings on the other side

Concrete stair railing

olive press stone

another home in the village old way of building with wood and bamboo(kalami) roof

delightful street only big enough for foot traffic, part of an intricate maze throughout the entire village. The twists and turns can be confusing- I assume it was helpful to surprise the enemy if the enemy didn't know the layout. 

How did it get his name? Below is part of a large Turkish home. The man who built this, obviously Turkish, was either named Gribiliana and thus, the town is still called that and yet others say that Gribiliana was an older name pre-Turks and the Turkish man adopted the name.  Either way this site is old. 

. 

These are left over from the Turkish occupation. We had fun finding the cornerstone in the arches. This was a huge palace like structure complete with levels, lovely stairs, a prison and places for animals. I don't know how tall the actual structure was but it was quite wide. 

close up of arch

Keep walking farther up and there is a wonderful church/homestead/scenery called Agios Ioannis. A true Cretan and fighter against the Germans during WW2,  Costas wanted to be buried overlooking his beloved Crete. In order to be buried at his favorite place, he had to build a church since no one in Greece can be buried outside of a church. Following pictures are the beautiful church, accoutrements of church life, a home and his gravesite. He must have been a spectacular man.

marble grave of Stellios

tiny church, the four of us could barely fit

podium

Jesus

Mano is like a bull in a china shop. Immediately
after this, I ushered him out. Still wondering how he didn't break anything. 

things for the church, incense, candles, lamp oil

bring your money and get a candle to light

 And of course, the boys ended their day with gyros with Nectarios. Don't worry- we feed them real food. They already had lentils (Fakes), potatoes and salad before going out. Paul doesn't need a recipe to make delicious and perfectly cooked lentils but I do.  Here's the best recipe I have used for Fakes ( Lentils)so far http://www.organicallycooked.com/2008/01/fakes-lentil-soup.html

Next post will be grape picking with the kids, grape crushing, etc. 

Off to the beach...